Tag Archives: Obama

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Five terrorist attacks succeeded under Obama, but none succeeded under Bush after 9/11

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The Weekly Standard reports.

Excerpt:

Congressman Tom Cotton took to the House floor “to express grave doubts about the Obama Administration’s counterterrorism policies and programs”.

“I rise today to express grave doubts about the Obama Administration’s counterterrorism policies and programs,” said the freshman congressman from Arkansas. “Counterterrorism is often shrouded in secrecy, as it should be, so let us judge by the results. In barely four years in office, five jihadists have reached their targets in the United States under Barack Obama: the Boston Marathon bomber, the underwear bomber, the Times Square Bomber, the Fort Hood shooter, and in my own state—the Little Rock recruiting office shooter. In the over seven years after 9/11 under George W. Bush, how many terrorists reached their target in the United States? Zero! We need to ask, ‘Why is the Obama Administration failing in its mission to stop terrorism before it reaches its targets in the United States?’

FIVE terrorist attacks linked to Islamic fundamentalism under Obama, but ZERO such attacks once Bush got serious after the 9/11 attack.

This accusation comes on the heels of a new Congressional report that shows that the Obama administration did indeed lie to cover up their failures on the Benghazi debacle.

The Washington Times summarized what’s in the report:

The report says the State Department quickly notified the White House that the attack was taking place in Benghazi, and that within two hours of the start of the attack the department was telling the White House that al Qaeda-linked Ansar al-Sharia was claiming responsibility for it.

“In an ‘Ops Alert’ issued shortly after the attack began, the State Department Operations Center notified senior Department officials, the White House Situation Room, and others, that the Benghazi compound was under attack and that ‘approximately 20 armed people fired shots; explosions have been heard as well,’” said the report.

“Two hours later, the Operations Center issued an alert that al-Qa’ida linked Ansar al-Sharia (AAS) claimed responsibility for the attack and had called for an attack on Embassy Tripoli,” said the report. “Neither alert mentioned that there had been a protest at the location of the attacks. Further, Administration documents provided to the Committees show that there was ample evidence that the attack was planned and intentional. The coordinated, complex, and deadly attack on the [CIA’s] Annex [down the road from the State Department mission]–that included sophisticated weapons–is perhaps the strongest evidence that the attacks were not spontaneous. “

“The U.S. government knew immediately that the attacks constituted an act of terror,” says the report.

The report says that the Obama administration purged references to al Qaeda from the talking points that U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Susan Rice used when she appeared on Sept. 16 on five Sunday talks shows to discuss the Benghazi attacks.

“After the attacks, the Administration perpetuated a deliberately misleading and incomplete narrative that the violence grew out of a demonstration caused by a YouTube video,” says the report. “The Administration consciously decided not to discuss extremist involvement or previous attacks against Western interests in Benghazi.”

“To protect the State Department, the Administration deliberately removed references to al Qaeda-linked groups and previous attacks in Benghazi in the talking points used by Ambassador Rice, thereby perpetuating the deliberately misleading and incomplete narrative that the attacks evolved from a demonstration caused by a YouTube video,” says the report.

The reports criticizes the administration for responding to the attack as a criminal event requiring an FBI investigation rather than as an act of terrorism against the United States requiring a military response.

Investors Business Daily is flat out saying that Hillary Clinton lied to cover up the Benghazi attack. (H/T Doug Ross)

The Obama administration ignored warnings from Russia

A third point to consider is this article from the Boston Globe. (H/T Hot Air)

Excerpt:

Russian authorities contacted the US government with concerns about Tamerlan Tsarnaev not once but “multiple’’ times, including an alert it sent after he was first investigated by FBI agents in Boston, raising new questions about whether the FBI should have paid more attention to the suspected Boston Marathon bomber, US senators briefed on the inves­tigation said Tuesday.

The FBI has previously said it interviewed Tsarnaev in early 2011 after it was initially contacted by the ­Russians. In their review, completed in summer 2011, the bureau found no ­evidence that Tsarnaev was a threat. “The FBI requested but did not receive more specific or additional information from” Russia, the agency said last week.

Following a closed briefing of the Senate Intelligence Committee Tuesday, Senator Richard Burr, a North Carolina Republican, said he believed that Russia alerted the United States about Tsarnaev in “multiple contacts,” including at least once since October 2011.

So, in view of these three points, why do you think it is that the Obama administration cannot keep us safe from attacks in the way that Bush could? Well, the first reason is that Bush was willing to go to war with states that harbored terrorists in order to deter future attacks. Obama pulls out of the places that are known to train and harbor terrorists. Terrorists interpret Obama’s retreats as weakness, and that’s why terrorist-sponsoring states feel confident about not cracking down within their own borders. Terrorists feared that Bush would do nasty things to them – like sanction strikes by Israel, or invading Syria, or blockading Iran – if they did not crack down on terrorism themselves and give up their WMDs (as Libya did).

The second reason is because Democrats can’t believe in their heart of hearts that evil could be caused by anyone other than America and conservative Americans. I’ve written before about how the Obama administration considers their political enemies to be the real terrorists. People who are pro-life, or want smaller government. That’s who this administration is focused on. So, we should not be surprised that the real terrorists are slipping by. Heck, we are even supplying terrorists with welfare to fund their attacks on us. Why shouldn’t we expect attacks to increase? We elected people who aren’t serious about dealing with our real enemies.

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Report: biofuels raise the cost of gas for little environmental benefit

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From the liberal BBC.

Excerpt:

A report by Chatham House says the growing reliance on sustainable liquid fuels will also increase food prices.

The author says that biodiesel made from vegetable oil was worse for the climate than fossil fuels.

Under EU law, biofuels are set to make up 5% of the UK’s transport fuel from today.

Since 2008, the UK has required fuel suppliers to add a growing proportion of sustainable materials into the petrol and diesel they supply. These biofuels are mainly ethanol distilled from corn and biodiesel made from rapeseed, used cooking oil and tallow.

But research carried out for Chatham House says that reaching the 5% level means that UK motorists will have to pay an extra £460m a year because of the higher cost of fuel at the pump and from filling up more often as biofuels have a lower energy content.

The report say that if the UK is to meet its obligations to EU energy targets the cost to motorists is likely to rise to £1.3bn per annum by 2020.

[…]There are also worries that taking EU land out of production to grow rapeseed oil in particular is creating more climate problems than it solves. The more fuel of this type that is put into cars the bigger the deficit created in the edible oils market. This had lead to increased imports of palm oil from Indonesia, often produced on deforested land.

“Once you take into account these indirect effects, biofuels made from vegetable oils actually result worldwide in more emissions than you would get from using diesel in the first place,” said Rob Bailey.

“Plus you are asking motorists to pay more for the fuel – it makes no sense, it is a completely irrational strategy.”

Meanwhile, closer to home:

The Obama administration on Monday renewed an interagency agreement that backs the development of biofuels for the aviation industry and reiterated its support for embattled federal renewable fuel targets.

U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack and Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood signed a pact extending a program that has worked with the private sector and rural communities to create an alternative to fossil fuels for aviation.

“We want to re-affirm the importance of this particular industry in this administration,” Vilsack told reporters at an industry conference in Washington.

The “Farm to Fly” program aims to support annual production of 1 billion gallons of aviation biofuels by 2018.

The program will focus on evaluating various sources of renewable alternatives to jet fuel, while also developing state and local partnerships with private companies.

Federal support for biofuels has come under increased scrutiny amid complaints from livestock producers and refiners that the federal biofuels mandate has contributed to higher food prices and could threaten gasoline supplies.

This isn’t a smart way to improve air quality, and it’s not going to help consumers who are already paying a ton of money for gas.

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Do Kermit Gosnell and Barack Obama have the same views on abortion?

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First, let’s look at this re-cap of the Gosnell story in the Atlantic. This story features a full re-cap of facts, and then concludes with a discussion of media bias.

Take a look at the facts of the case:

On February 18, 2010, the FBI raided the “Women’s Medical Society,” entering its offices about 8:30 p.m. Agents expected to find evidence that it was illegally selling prescription drugs. On entering, they quickly realized something else was amiss. In the grand jury report’s telling, “There was blood on the floor. A stench of urine filled the air. A flea-infested cat was wandering through the facility, and there were cat feces on the stairs. Semi-conscious women scheduled for abortions were moaning in the waiting room or the recovery room, where they sat on dirty recliners covered with blood-stained blankets. All the women had been sedated by unlicensed staff.” Authorities had also learned about the patient that died at the facility several months prior.

Public health officials inspected the surgery rooms. “Instruments were not sterile,” the grand jury states. “Equipment was rusty and outdated. Oxygen equipment was covered with dust, and had not been inspected. The same corroded suction tubing used for abortions was the only tubing available for oral airways if assistance for breathing was needed. There was no functioning resuscitation or even monitoring equipment, except for a single blood pressure cuff.” Upon further inspection, “the search team discovered fetal remains haphazardly stored throughout the clinic – in bags, milk jugs, orange juice cartons, and even in cat-food containers.”

And “Gosnell admitted to Detective Wood that at least 10 to 20 percent of the fetuses were probably older than 24 weeks in gestation – even though Pennsylvania law prohibits abortions after 24 weeks. In some instances, surgical incisions had been made at the base of the fetal skulls.” Gosnell’s medical license was quickly suspended. 18 days later, The Department of Health filed papers to start the process of closing the clinic. The district attorney submitted the case to the grand jury on May 4, 2010. Testimony was taken from 58 witnesses. Evidence was examined.

In Pennsylvania, most doctors won’t perform abortions after the 20th week, many for health reasons, others for moral reasons. Abortions after 24 weeks are illegal. Until 2009, Gosnell reportedly performed mostly first and second trimester abortions. But his clinic had come to develop a bad reputation, and could attract only women who couldn’t get an abortion elsewhere, former employees have said. “Steven Massof estimated that in 40 percent of the second-trimester abortions performed by Gosnell, the fetuses were beyond 24 weeks gestational age,” the grand jury states. “Latosha Lewis testified that Gosnell performed procedures over 24 weeks ‘too much to count,’ and ones up to 26 weeks ‘very often.’ …in the last few years, she testified, Gosnell increasingly saw out-of-state referrals, which were all second-trimester, or beyond. By these estimates, Gosnell performed at least four or five illegal abortions every week.”

Now let’s recall what Obama’s position is on born-alive abortion:

There wasn’t any question about what was happening. The abortions were going wrong. The babies weren’t cooperating. They wouldn’t die as planned. Or, as Illinois state senator Barack Obama so touchingly put it, there was “movement or some indication that, in fact, they’re not just coming out limp and dead.”

No, Senator. They wouldn’t go along with the program. They wouldn’t just come out limp and dead.

They were coming out alive. Born alive. Babies. Vulnerable human beings Obama, in his detached pomposity, might otherwise include among “the least of my brothers.” But of course, an abortion extremist can’t very well be invoking Saint Matthew, can he? So, for Obama, the shunning of these least of our brothers and sisters – millions of them – is somehow not among America’s greatest moral failings.

But not Barack Obama. As an Illinois state senator, he voted to permit infanticide. And now, running for president, he banks on media adulation to insulate him from his past.

The record, however, doesn’t lie.

Infanticide is a bracing word. But in this context, it’s the only word that fits. Obama heard the testimony of a nurse, Jill Stanek. She recounted how she’d spent 45 minutes holding a living baby left to die.

And let’s review Obama’s position on partial-birth abortion:

Obama’s 2008 endorsement of late-term abortion bans also appeared to be in conflict with his support for the Freedom of Choice Act. In 2007, Obama cosponsored the Freedom of Choice Act (FOCA), which would strike down restrictions on abortion at the state and federal level. The bill stated that all abortions must be legal before “viability” for any reason and that abortions must be legal until birth if a woman’s health is at risk. FOCA does not contain a definition of “health,” therefore “anything an abortionist says is related to ‘health’ is sufficient,” according to Douglas Johnson, legislative director of the National Right to Life Committee. “A state would not be able to adopt any limiting definition (for example, defining ‘health’ to exclude emotional distress), because that would be to narrow and infringe on the federally guaranteed right which FOCA would establish.  The entire purpose of FOCA is to prohibit any narrowing of the federally guaranteed right — for example, by requiring parental notification, or by refusing to fund abortions.”

Could it be that the reason that the media is not reporting on this story is because they are trying to protect the President?

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